Unemployment rate falls to 5.036%

Reuters/Charles Platiau

Notably, economists consider a 5% rate to indicate full employment.

But while that number is accurate, it's imprecise.

The issue is rounding.

In October, 7.908 million Americans were unemployed. The civilian labor force, which included the employed and everyone looking for jobs, was at 157.028 million.

So based on those numbers, the unemployment rate is actually closer to 5.036%.

Meanwhile, in September, there were 7.915 million unemployed and 156.715 million in the labor force, which meant that the unemployment rate was about 5.051%. (The officially reported number was 5.1%.)

Which makes October's number a 0.015% drop in the unemployment rate from the previous month.